News

The Longview City Council identified street maintenance as one of its top strategic initiatives and the community will soon begin to see the benefits of that priority. To improve the condition of Longview’s streets, the City Council budgeted an additional $518,000 this year (52.9% more than 2016) to hire staff to create one additional street maintenance crew, purchase additional equipment for use by all street maintenance crews, and purchase more rock, asphalt, and concrete raw material than in prior years. This emphasis on funding increased street maintenance will allow the Street Maintenance Division to double the amount of streets maintained each year, completing pavement preservation, repair, or replacement activities on about 20 lane-miles of roadway each year. A lane-mile is a section of roadway one mile long by 12-feet wide.

All of the new staff has been hired and the new equipment ordered. However, new street maintenance activities will not be fully productive during 2017 because of the training period for new staff, some equipment will not be received until October, and our unusually long lasting wet and colder weather has delayed the start of pavement maintenance activities. To meet our performance goals for 2017, other staff will be temporarily assigned to pavement maintenance until the new street crew and equipment is fully functional.

The City Council also created a transportation benefit district to focus on pavement restoration. In February, the City Council, acting as the board of the transportation benefit district, imposed a $20 vehicle license renewal fee for vehicles registered within the city limits. Renewal notices issued by the Department of Licensing should contain the additional fee beginning in August. This fee is projected to generate about $560,000 in revenue each year, which will be used to improve pavement condition. The first project funded by the vehicle license renewal fee will be repaving 15th Avenue from Maple Street to Hudson Street. This section of roadway is significantly deteriorated and regularly generates complaints from motorists.